


I Have (Not) Lost One

by MercuryGray



Category: Dunkirk (2017)
Genre: Aftermath, Father-Daughter Relationship, Forgiveness, Gen, Homecoming, Parenthood, Post-Canon, Returning Home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 17:11:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13415814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MercuryGray/pseuds/MercuryGray
Summary: Dunkirk is lost, and Commander Bolton is finally on his way home - if he has any home left to return to himself, that is.





	I Have (Not) Lost One

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gentle_herald](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentle_herald/gifts).



> For a prompt on tumblr: Mr Dawson and Commander Bolton, fatherhood (literal or figurative)

The last ship was quiet.

There were no cheers, no shouts - just tired, desperate men anxious to be out of the nightmare. They lumped themselves into corners and onto benches like forgotten playthings, sprawled and folded, uncaring where or how they lay and unwilling (or unable, from fatigue or shock) to move. Every so often a hand would move a cigarette to a mouth, an eye flicker at the passing of a nurse or deckhand, but as a whole they looked like men dead.

Bolton glanced up from his cooling cup of coffee, surveying these last with equally tired eyes.  _Behold, O Lord.  I have not lost a one of those you gave me._

It was not true, of course; they had lost many, too many, and left them, moreover, on the beaches for the Germans to bury. He hoped they would. Death was the only certainty in war, and he hoped that those soldiers, coming on that beach, would recognize that the dead men on the sand might one day be them, and treat them as they wanted to be treated in death. He hoped when they came upon the bodies, they thought of their own mothers, and children, and sweethearts, waiting for news of them at home.

Home. In the breast-pocket of his uniform there was a photograph, which he did not take out. He had not done so throughout the week that he had been in France, and he did not intend to do so now, for he thought he might cry, which would do no one any good.

He’d lost the one in the photograph, too.

He had not known, of course, that he would be gone so long; when they’d asked for volunteers in Portsmouth he’d raised his hand hardly knowing what he was going out to do. They’d dressed for heavy weather, brought nothing with them but what they’d had in their pockets when they’d arrived from cancelled leaves and offices and homes- pencils, cigarette cases, bits of string and ticket stubs.  His wallet had been in his jacket; in one of its folds there was the photograph - old but still a good likeness.

The temptation to take it out had haunted him daily on the Mole, but that was the wish of dying men, to see one last familiar face before the end - and he was not dying. _Not today, anyway._ That was what he had reminded himself, when the urge had come upon him. It seemed to tempt fate, and so he had left it in his pocket, determined that he would not need it, that by that deprivation, death would not find him here. In his pocket it was safe, from the ravages of the wind and the sea-spray and the dive-bombers, and somehow, in his mind, if the photograph was safe, then the person in it was safe, too.

They’d had such a row about joining up.

   
_“Let other people’s sons -”_  
“Other sons? Dad, that’s rich. I’ve as much right as any one to do my bit.”   
“This family’s already giving –”   
“Right, we’re giving you, Dad, but I want to go, too.”   
“Can’t you do something else - the ambulance service, or…the ARP are looking.” Oh, the pure murder in the look he got for that. _“I don’t want to lose you!”_  How could he explain the anguish of a father for his only child? But nothing had stuck.

Such a lot of angry words - and in the end, In the morning there was an empty bedroom and a note. That had been eight months ago; he’d left the house in Portsmouth empty when he’d gone to his next assignment, leaving the keys with the neighbor, in case, by some chance, a visit were wished for. He’d left his own note, too, begging forgiveness, trying to pour as much of his love onto the page as it could hold. As he thought about it, it was probably still sitting on the table, gathering dust. So much for home.

“Sir.” One of the officers tapped his shoulder. “We’re nearly there. They’ve radioed - The Admiral would like to -”

He nodded, self-consciously raising his hand to his face to feel the stubble. When was the last time he had slept?

There were no cheering crowds at the docks - a small mercy - replaced, instead, by a small official looking party in naval blue, waiting expectantly at the pier. Well, that would be them. Bolton watched them lower the gangplank and tried to shuffle down it with as much dignity as he could manage given how little sleep he’d had. Men watched from the deck with silent interest. God, his uniform must look a fright. The pier seemed to go on for miles, walking it alone.

“Sir.” The practiced formalities came so easily - and if the salute was not quite as quick and crisp as he would have liked, he hoped he was excused. But the waiting party did not seem to care - there were no frowns, or stern looks - only smiles, rare and radiant smiles, and, quite suddenly, the sound of clapping. The Admiral did not return the salute, but rather seemed to give one of his own, the highest acknowledgement he could give. Bolton suddenly felt very humble. “I hope you will let me shake your hand, sir,” the Admiral said, extending his own for a hearty shake. “Job very well done.”

He tried to mumble something about just doing one’s duty, but it was lost; the Admiral pressed on instead. “…took the liberty of bringing someone - not strictly on form, but - done splendid work for us at Dover the last two weeks, absolutely tireless, one of our best.  Heard your name in communiques and wouldn’t hear of leaving the post - damned near brought you home single-handed. But I see where she gets it from!”

She!

Yes, there she was, behind the Admiral. She looked so well, standing there in her blues with her gold braid on her sleeve - he read the familiar code of stripes and loops and could not help but beam with pride - a commissioned officer already! Seeing her, it all came back - the shouting, the hurt faces, the accusations, the pointed fingers, the slammed doors. The determined face the next morning at breakfast, the car driving off.  And of course she’d picked the Navy - it was what she had said all along. She’d hung behind her commander all this while, but now, let off the leash of ceremony, dashed forward.

She nearly knocked him off his feet with the force of her hug, all young arms, oblivious to the world, to rank, to bygones, and did not let him go. And he did not let go, either, trying to say, in so many silences, _I missed you, I love you, I am so very, very proud of you_. The photograph in his pocket pressed between them, the picture of a girl who was now grown-up. When she spoke, breaking the silence, her voice was tiny and wonder-struck again, words for him alone. “Dad, you’re home.”

Bolton stood in his daughter’s arms and wept.

**Author's Note:**

> When I got this prompt, I knew I wanted to do a couple of things: I wanted to make it about Bolton, I wanted to give him a daughter, I wanted her to meet him at the dock in this great big surprise, and I wanted to make the fact that the woman at the dock is his daughter a big surprise. (If you read closely, you'll notice there's no reference to gender until they're on the pier. That's intentional.) I actually started writing this with Bolton on the boat looking at the photograph and talking about his daughter to one of the men with him, but that didn't quite work, so I started over with this idea that they'd had a fight about her joining up, left things badly between them, and now had all this guilt that (for him) he might have died not telling her he was angry but proud and (for her) she might have lost him without letting him know she wanted to do something he'd be proud of and, in a small way, be the son he didn't have. (There's a lot of unwritten backstory here about legacies and the expectations we have for our children, but there wasn't room or time for it, nor, really, any need.) So here's this guy saving all these other people's children in this totally selfless way - while wondering what his own child is getting up to.
> 
> In the shuffle Mrs. Bolton never materialized in my mind, and I thought it added a little bit more bittersweetness if their family, their home was just the two of them - and thus, by her showing up at the dock, 'home' has come for him, too. 
> 
> "I have not lost one of those you gave me" is a take on John 18:9, part of Jesus' arrest in the Garden at Gethsemane. "This was to fulfill the word that he had spoken, 'I did not lose a single one of those whom you gave me.'"
> 
> PBS did a special on the culture of death during the Civil War and discussed at length about how the Victorian idea of 'a good death' was where you died at home surrounded by family members, and how soldiers during the Civil War would pull out their family photographs when they were dying on the battlefield to mimic this experience. Bolton's reticence to look at his daughter's photo came out of that.
> 
> And if anyone is wondering, I think the daughter's name is Kate. (Perhaps her father has a fondness for Shakespeare? Can we make that an in-joke?) Or Sub-Lieutenant Bolton, if you like; it's the lowest commissioned rank in the WRNS. (I'm woefully under-supplied on information on the WRNS and whether 8 months is enough time to earn a commission, but I do know that they were on staff at Dover Castle and in the Dynamo Room helping Admiral Ramsey and his staff coordinate the evacuation.)
> 
> Credit due to @oldshrewsburyian for the term 'expressive silence', which I thought a lot about while writing this.


End file.
